October is so called from its having been the eighth month. In this month the Romans sacrificed a horse in remembrance of the horse of Troy, which fell, as the leaves do, and died in October. This absurdity was followed by another. Having cut off the tail, a flamen went off with it in a priest, in order to let some of the blood drop on his hearth. The row which the Roman housemaid (ancilla domestica) used to make in consequence of what she irreverently called this nasty going on, may be imagined, for it is not recorded. Perhaps the phrase of fighting pro aris et focis, was derived from flamen’s cutting down the “area” and making the aforesaid mess on the clean kitchen “hearth,” the female domestic pitching into him like a mountain cat who guards her young.
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